KNOXVILLE – Fans won’t get their first glimpse of Tennessee’s new-look basketball team under first-year coach Rick Barnes for another six days.
The Volunteers don’t have to wait that long to get a measure of where they are.
Continuing a trend Barnes did for a decade at Texas, Tennessee will play Davidson today at Thompson-Boling Arena in one of those behind-closed-door scrimmages that many teams now use to help their preseason preparations.
“We’ll get a really good gauge,” Barnes said before Tuesday’s practice. “I can tell you this, of all the things that we do, we’ve felt like for years and years scrimmaging Davidson is the best thing that we do, because they do so many great things that exposes you in so many different areas of the game. We’ll learn so much from that scrimmage.
“I’ve got great respect for Bob (McKillop, Davidson’s coach) and his program, and he’s truly one of the great coaches in the game. His guys, they know how to carve you up. It’s going to be great for our guys.”